Al Qasimi Professor of Arabic Studies and Islamic Material Culture

My research focuses on maritime culture and the Islamic world; ethnography of the material culture and heritage of the Western Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean; lexical development of maritime and nautical terminology. I have particular interest in the socio-cultural history and provenance of the traditional sailing water craft, the sea people and their activities, folklore belief and practices, resources and trade in the Western Indian Ocean. I have conducted extensive maritime ethnographic fieldwork on the coasts of the Arabian Gulf and Oman between 1990 and 2000, and the African and Arabian coasts of the Red Sea from 2002 to 2014.

New Book (forthcoming)

The Life of the Red Sea Dhow: A Cultural History of Seaborne Exploration in the Islamic World
In my new book I offer a wide-ranging cultural history of the iconic dhow from medieval to modern times based on primary and secondary sources together with ethnographic fieldwork on the African and Arabian coasts of the Red Sea. While the history of global and seafaring exploration is more popular than ever, seaborne discovery from Islamic lands remains an understudied subject. Whether discussing trade and salt routes; shoals and wind patterns; spice harvest seasons; litanies and votive offerings to the sea; or the deep and resonant connection between language, memory and oral tradition, this is the first book to place the dhow in its full and remarkable cultural contexts.

Written Books

Data collected from the area has been triangulated with extensive archival material and archaeological finds to establish a historical and cultural pattern of the life of a maritime people in a unique multi-disciplinary series of research outputs:

(a) In the Wake of the Dhow (hardback 2002; paperback 2009; translated into Arabic 2009) is the product of over two hundred interviews; it documents the dhow as an important element in the prosperity of the region before the discovery of oil, we find in this book the geographical conditions and the historical-linguistic background of each dhow-type, the life pattern in its role as cargo, pearl-diving, pirate and slaving vessel and also how the seafaring communities interacted with the dhow world.

(b) Seafaring in the Arabian Gulf and Oman (hardback 2005; paperback 2009; translated into Arabic 2015 [forthcoming]) brings together the different measures of time past, the sea, its people and their material culture. The Arabian Gulf and Oman have traditionally shared a common destiny within the Western Indian Ocean. The seasonal monsoonal winds were fundamental to the physical and human unities of the seafaring communities, producing a way of life in harmony with the natural world - a world which was abruptly changed with the discovery of oil. What remains is memories of a seafaring past, a history of traditions and customs recorded here in the recollections of a dying generation and in the rich artistic heritage of the region.

(c) Classic Ships of Islam (hardback 2008; paperback 2014; translated into Arabic 2010) http://www.amazon.com/Classic-Ships-Islam-Mesopotamia This book charts the development of Islamic ships and boats in the Western Indian Ocean from the seventh to the early sixteenth century with reference to earlier periods. It utilizes mainly Classical and Medieval Arabic literary sources with iconographical evidence and archaeological finds. The interdependence of various trading activities in the region resulted in a cross fertilization, not only of goods but also of ideas and culture which gave an underlying cohesion to the Arabian, Persian and Indian maritime peoples. This study has led to a re-evaluation of that maritime culture, showing that it was predominantly Persian and Indian, with Chinese influence, throughout the Islamic period until the coming of the Portuguese, as reflected in nautical terminology and technology.

Projects

Present Project:

Principal Investigator of the project on Magic in Malta, 1605: Sellem Bin al-Sheikh Mansur and the Roman Inquisition, with Catherine Rider, History Department and funded by the Arts & Humanities Research Council (2014-2016). The project studies an inquisitional document discovered in the Mdina archives in Malta in 1972 dealing with the trial of Sellem, a Muslim astrologer and galley slave of the Military and Hospitaller Order of St John and his involvement in the practice of magic, particularly geomancy, on the islands of Malta in the Early Modern period. Aspects of Maltese and Mediterranean history, such as Christian-Muslim relations in the period, the role of the religious and secular powers of the papal Inquisition and Knights of the Order on Malta, and cultural diffusion in an area of intense political and religious contact, are some of the many themes to be explored through studying a document written in Latin and Italian with Arabic terminology. http://socialsciences.exeter.ac.uk/iais/research/projects/magicinmalta1605

Projects completed include:

1. Principal investigator of the MARES project -Maritime ethnography of the Red Sea - funded by the GoldenWeb Foundation and the Seven Pillars of Wisdom Trust (2008-2011). MARES was a multi-disciplinary, multi-period project focusing on the maritime traditions of the peoples of the Red Sea. Drawing on ethnography, archaeology, history and linguistics. It sought to understand how people have inhabited and navigated these seascapes in late antiquity and the medieval period, and how they continue to do so today. http://projects.exeter.ac.uk/mares/

2. Co-investigator with Mustapha El-Lahlali, Professor in Arabic Studies at the University of Leeds and funded by a British Academy (2009) award, to examine a criminal case against a former slave, Georgio Scala, accused by the inquisition in Malta of apostasy and involvement with Moorish slaves in 1598. The document, written in Latin and Italian, came to light in the Mdina archives in Malta in 1972. By studying the trial of one man we were able to uncover valuable historical information, such as the discovery of the Sfaxi (North African)) dialect in the letters written by galley slaves, while other facets of the case explored new questions of religious and cultural interaction among the Maltese community and the Mediterranean world of Early Modern times. http://socialsciences.exeter.ac.uk/iais/research/projects/agius/

3. Principal investigator of an Arts & Humanities Research Council award (2002-2005) to examine Arabic paper fragments of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries uncovered at Quseir al-Qadim on the Egyptian Red Sea coast by the University of Southampton archaeological team between 1999-2003. The output was: a) to evaluate the texts combined with archaeological inquiry; b) to examine the content and context of the discoveries within the framework of the long-distance trade and pilgrim traffic from Quseir as a chief port of the Red Sea region and its trade contacts with the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean (India and East Africa); c) to raise public and scholarly awareness about the significance of the documents as a source of academic, educational and community interest so that comparative work will be possible in subsequent research. The value of this interdisciplinary project was that it brought together a diverse range of scholars and approaches whose input contributes to a comparative analysis of the material. The discussions offered a clearer hypothesis as to the cultural patterns that lie beneath the surface of the Islamic habitation.

4. Investigator into the cultural history of the dhow in the Arabian Gulf and Oman funded by the Leverhulme Trust (1996-1998). The project aimed to study traditional dhows of the Gulf and Oman based on my ethnographic fieldwork.

Other academic activities

I am founding editor of Al-Masāq: Journal of the Medieval Mediterranean (1988), founder of the Society of the Medieval Mediterranean (1997) and founder of the Medieval Mediterranean Biennial Conference series (2009)

Fellowship

Elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (2013)

Elected Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society (2015)

Membership

Member of the Centre for Gulf Studies and Middle East Humanities

Book Prize Awards

Major Prize

The Abdullah Al-Mubarak Al-Sabah Foundation and the British-Kuwait Friendship Society major book prize for Seafaring in the Arabian Gulf and Oman: The People of the Dhow

Honourable Mention

The Keith Matthews Prize for Classic Ships of Islam: From Mesopotamia to the Indian Ocean

Highly Commended

The Keith Muckelroy Memorial Award for Classic Ships of Islam: From Mesopotamia to the Indian Ocean

Nomination

Georgio Scala and the Moorish Slaves nominated for the National Book Prize

Research interests

Objects are active agents helping to shape people the way they are. It is this people-object-world combination that is integral to the human mind and language. The key question to my study is why objects are called the way they are? My search into the use of Arabic and material culture is an inquiry into communities, social, technical, political and religious conditions. It is about the identity of a people, their language and culture, demonstrating their specialized skills and artistic imagination to produce objects of use within their community and the outside world. With this in mind my research for the past forty years has been devoted to the study of the maritime cultural landscape of the Arabian Gulf and Oman and the African and Arabian Red Sea.

For more information, see profile.

Research supervision

In his research Professor D. A. Agius shows that objects are active agents helping to shape people the way they are. It is this people-object-world combination that is integral to the human mind and language. The key question to his study is why objects are called the way they are? His search into the use of Arabic and Materail Culture is an inquiry into communities, social, technical, political and religious conditions. It is about the identity of a people, their language and culture, demonstrating their specialised skills and artistic imagination to produce objects of use within their community and the outside world. With this in mind his research for the past thirty years has been devoted to the study of ship-types of the Arab Mediterranean and Arabian Indian Ocean, the language of the coastal and seafaring communities, ship-building, navigational techniques and winds and currents; in addition, his study entails a great deal of archival work, pictorial evidence and maps.

Other information

This research was also possible with funding from the British Council and the Ministry of Information of Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.

Research Title: "Ship-types in the Gulf: An historical-linguistic inquiry".

This study looked at traditional ships and boats in the Persian/Arabian Gulf with the aim of establishing an historical and linguistic link between the present and the medieval Islamic period. My research was based on field work collecting information (over 200 interviews) from seamen and fishermen, master-builders and carpenters on different techniques of dhow-building. Also the research extended to pictorial evidence, maps and references to maritime ethnography. The findings of this study have been published in In the Wake of the Dhow: The Arabian Gulf and Oman, pp. xxiv+253.Reading: Garnet, 2002 and Seafaring in the Arabian Gulf and Oman: The People of the Dhow. xiii+285. London: Kegan Paul Limited, 2005, reprinted twice.

Arts & Humanities Research Council – Major Grant (2002-2005)

Research Title: “Reconstructing the Quseiri Arabic Documents”

The research objective was to read or reconstruct the Arabic documents of the Ayyubid to Mamluk periods (13th to 15th centuries) (paper fragments, coins and ostrich eggs), unearthed by the University of Southampton archaeological team (1999-2003) at the harbour town of Quseir al-Qadim on the Egyptian Red Sea coast. The proposed output is: a) to evaluate the texts combined with archaeological inquiry; b) to examine the content and context within the framework of the long-distance trade and pilgrim traffic from Quseir as a chief port of the Red Sea region and its trade contacts with the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean (India and East Africa).

"Is Maltese directly linked with Siculo Arabic or the North African dialects?".
24 July 1996, Institute of Linguistics, University of Malta.

"A review of the Arab and Muslim travellers' and geographers' works available and their portrayal of the region's economic and social setting".
8 April 1996, Juma Al Majid Centre for Culture and Heritage, Dubai, The UAE University, Al-Ain and The Cultural Foundation, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.

"The dhow and the Gulf: Links with traditional Arab seafaring".
15 February 1995, Arabic and Islamic Studies, University of Exeter.